U.S. President Joe Biden has summoned senior Israeli military, intelligence and humanitarian officials to Washington for talks about Israel’s planned ground invasion of Rafah, following the first call between Biden and Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu in over a month yesterday. In announcing the talks, national security adviser Jake Sullivan said Israel lacks a “coherent and sustainable strategy” to defeat Hamas. (Washington Post)
Background
Biden had been expressing objections to Israel’s actions in Gaza for the past few months, particularly over the Israeli military’s use of “indiscriminate bombing,” as Biden characterized it, and the worsening humanitarian conditions in Gaza, which the U.N. has blamed in large part on Israel’s obstruction of aid delivery into the territory.
Recently, those criticisms have ramped up—significantly. Not only have Biden and his advisers been more public about their objections, as highlighted above, but VP Kamala Harris met with Benny Gantz—a member of Israel’s war cabinet who is considered a top rival of Netanyahu—earlier this month in Washington, a move seen as a snub of Netanyahu. Meanwhile, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, a Democrat, on Thursday called for new elections in Israel.